


Only Sort Of

by kristophine



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Established Relationship, Extensive Discussion of Death, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-05-19
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:53:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24261631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kristophine/pseuds/kristophine
Summary: “Bucky—”“No.”“Bucky—”“No.”“James Buchanan Barnes—”“Absolutely not.”“Look, asshole—”“I saidnoand that isthe last word on the subjectthat anybody’s going to have, all right?” said Bucky, so naturally, three hours later, he was letting Steve drive (he had a death-wish, he had to have some kind of death-wish) his beautiful T-bird (Bucky spent quality time with it every summer weekend, washing and waxing it until it gleamed) up the highway to visit Nat. Beautiful day for a drive, his ass.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 30
Kudos: 166





	Only Sort Of

“Bucky—”

“No.”

“ _Bucky—_ ”

“No.”

“James Buchanan Barnes—”

“Absolutely not.”

“Look, asshole—”

“I said _no_ and that is _the last word on the subject_ that anybody’s going to have, all right?” said Bucky, so naturally, three hours later, he was letting Steve drive (he had a death-wish, he _had_ to have some kind of death-wish) his beautiful T-bird (Bucky spent quality time with it every summer weekend, washing and waxing it until it gleamed) up the highway to visit Nat. Beautiful day for a drive, his _ass._

Bucky propped his feet up on the dash, or tried to, but the problem with being tall was that he could never manage quite the charming insouciance with which Steve had (in the distant past, when he was fifteen inches shorter) propped his feet up on his mother’s coffee table when she was absent, grinning, accidentally showing off the holes in his socks.

In the end he grimly returned his feet to the floor. It was his car, anyway. He didn’t want to be cleaning toe-prints off the inside of the windshield. He wiggled his toes inside his socks: it was 300 degrees outside, give or take, and ever since Tunisia he’d hated hot summers.

“Turn up the AC,” he grumbled at Steve.

“Turn it up yourself. I’m driving.”

“You have two hands. I only have one.”

“You have one real hand and one _very_ convincing fake.”

“You know people think you’re the nice one?” Bucky snorted. “They honest to God think you’re the _nice_ one.”

“I can’t help what people think about me,” Steve lied breezily, using his left hand to roll down the window on his side.

Bucky abandoned the obvious lie to attack the more pressing issue. “I said the AC, not the windows! You’re going to let all the cold air out!”

“Make me,” said Steve.

“You’re driving! What do you want me to do, fight you?”

Steve grinned. “That’s _one_ thing you could do.”

“You squirrelly son of a bitch,” muttered Bucky. He slouched lower in his seat. His T-bird was beautiful but not, perhaps, as comfortable for two big guys as Steve’s SUV. “Why didn’t we take _your_ car?”

“Because your car is sexy.”

“Oh, now my _car_ is sexy.”

“Are you jealous I said your car is sexy but not you?”

“No. I _know_ I’m sexy.”

“Especially when you wash the car,” murmured Steve, smiling. Somehow he’d lowered his eyelashes so when Bucky turned his head they were just a golden fringe, catching the light. “Love the whole wet white t-shirt thing you do, with the little ripped jean short-shorts, very MTV.”

“You were _frozen_ during MTV.”

“I read.” Steve waggled his eyebrows.

“And that’s a George Takei line! Listen, buddy—”

“I’m not _saying_ we should make out, I’m just saying if we did I might turn the AC on.”

“You’re _blackmailing_ me for kissing? You know I just do that anyway, right? As a hobby?”

“I like a challenge.” Steve grinned at him before looking back at the road.

“You’re a menace.”

“ _You’re_ a menace.”

It had taken a long time for Steve to get comfortable slinging him that kind of shit again, after the war. Bucky liked it.

“Maybe you should try washing my car,” said Bucky.

Steve started humming Too Sexy For My Shirt. Bucky lightly smacked the back of his head. “Hey,” Steve protested, “I’m just proving that I use my massive, superpowered brain to keep up to date with all the hip trends!”

“That song is _decades old._ ”

“Yeah, well, you’re a dinosaur.”

“If I kiss you, will you roll up your motherfucking window and put on the AC?”

“Yes.”

Bucky leaned over and kissed Steve—not on the mouth, and not even on the cheek, but on his neck; right where the curve of his neck started to sweep up to his jaw. Steve turned a little pink. Bucky sat back in his seat.

“Was that so hard?” Steve rolled up his window and punched the button for the AC.

“No,” said Bucky, “but you will b—”

“Oh, shut the fuck up.”

“You shut the fuck up.”

“You sound like a twelve year old kid,” muttered Steve, hitting the gas to take them around a curve at a speed that any police officers in the county would have objected to. “Wah wah wah, I’m too hot, wah wah, you drive too fast.”

“You’re a maniac, that’s why I sound like that.”

“You’re a _square._ ” Steve pushed the gas a little harder, presumably to really drive home his point.

“And you think you’re cool now?” Bucky was incredulous.

“I’m cool!”

“You’re not cool.”

“A lot of people would happen to disagree with you.”

“Yeah, well, they haven’t seen you trip on your own big feet, now have they?”

“You know what they say about big feet.”

“I see you naked _all the time._ I know _exactly_ how big your cock is.”

Steve laughed out loud. “That’s right, you do.”

“Shut up. I’m saying we _fuck,_ you can stop trying to impress me with your dick.”

“Oh, can I stop trying? I think you’d have something to say about that if I did.”

“Damn right I would.”

“Hey,” said Steve, voice suddenly different. Bucky looked over at him. Steve was frowning out the windshield, looking deeply serious. “You think Nat’s all right?”

Bucky couldn’t quite manage such a light, easy response to that. It took him a couple of seconds to think of something. “She’s always all right.”

“Yeah, but…” Steve sighed. “She was sort of…”

“Sort of dead? Look, all of us have been _sort of_ dead. It only counts if it sticks.”

Steve couldn’t help a little snort of laughter. He ran a hand over his mouth and jaw, though, still worked up over it. “I wish she’d talk about it.”

“Like you were so great at talking about it?” Bucky rolled his eyes. “Come on. You’re not a shrink, and there isn’t a shrink alive who could understand her. Maybe a dead one. They had a real smart fucker in the Red Room for a while, that lady made her, might have been able to decode her now. But not us. We’re just there for some lemonade.”

“Think she’ll buy it?”

“Not for a second.”

Steve smiled. He still looked a little bleak. Bucky draped an arm around Steve’s shoulders—well, as much as he comfortably could from his side of the car—and ran his fingers up into Steve’s hair.

“She’ll be okay,” said Bucky. “Sooner or later. She can join the club.”

“What club?”

“The Dead Poets’ Society.”

Steve groaned. “Really? _Really?_ ”

“Hey, it’s better than the Resurrection Rodeo. And she’s got lots of company. Phil died first, remember? Before it was a trend.”

“A _trend,_ ” muttered Steve resentfully.

“Okay, fine, you were the second one to sort of die. I went first.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“You always did have to copy everything I did.”

“Like suck dick.”

“Yeah, like that.” Bucky gripped Steve’s hair and tugged it a little. Steve grunted in annoyance. “She just had to wait until it was passé to die.”

The tension was leaving Steve’s shoulders. Bucky went back to running a hand through Steve’s hair. It was his left one, and it interfaced with his neural network just fine. He’d given up being horrified by it a long time ago.

“Love you,” said Steve absently.

“Love you too.” Bucky kissed him again, dropped one on his ear that time, and waited until he could feel the change in Steve’s face that meant a smile before he leaned back.

He took a deep breath of the icy air blasting from the dash.

It was a good day for a drive, anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyway, fuck those plot-mangling douchebags, am I right? Nat is alive and living in upstate New York. She has dogs and a couple of heavily booby-trapped acres. How she got un-dead doesn't matter. She likes summer; it's warm.


End file.
